spirit and healing in africa - University of the Free State

ut should have narratives and personal experiences from those who are involved in the battle,
while at the same time local and regional differences should be taken into consideration.
4.1.2 HIV/AIDS as an African epidemic
Although there is no definitive answer to questions like when, where and how HIV came into
existence, the origins of HIV are often associated with Africa, based on the concept that zoonotic
transfer (the transfer of a virus from animals to human beings), as is generally accepted in
scientific and biomedical realms, was the instigator of the HIV epidemic. On the basis of a study
lasting ten years, there is strong evidence of a direct link between a specific virus that is found in
African chimpanzees (SIVcpz) and the lethal virus HIV-1 in human beings (Gao et.al. 1999;
Wolfe et.al. 2004). This link may explain the original source of HIV, but the various theories
about how the virus moved from animals to human beings are controversial and still unsolved.
However, whether considering the so-called hunter theory (local people hunting and eating
chimpanzees), the polio vaccine theory (the vaccine may have been infected by SIVcpz, and
subsequently spread among people who were being immunized), the contaminated needle theory
(medical interventions were done without sterilized needles in order to bring down the costs), the
colonialism theory (working conditions and living circumstances of local people were heavily
affected and worsened by colonial forces, resulting in poor health prone to further weakening of
the immune system), or the conspiracy theory (HIV was manmade, and aimed to control African
politics and economics), all theories presuppose and expand further on the idea of zoonosis
taking place somewhere in Central Africa.
Despite the general theory of zoonotic transfer from chimpanzees to human beings, there are a
substantial number of studies that bring the objectivity of this conclusion into question (see
Chirimuuta & Chirimuuta 1989; Kalipeni et.al. 2004:14; Denis 2006:18), or highlight the
difficulties that arise with reconstructing the origin and initial spread of HIV: the quest for the
origin of HIV focuses on Africa, but a definite answer about the viral leap from animals to man
is lacking. Yet this HIV origins reconstruction comes at a high cost for Africa, because it is
compatible with discussions of racism and neocolonialism (Craddock 2004:3f). Denis (2006:18)
stresses that “the question of the origins of AIDS, although independent of the seriousness of the
epidemic in Africa, is ideologically and politically linked to it”. Stereotypic opinions that see
Africa as the source of disease and famine, and banal interpretations of Africans as sexually
deviant people, still permeate the discourse on HIV/AIDS in Africa (Stillwaggon 2003:809f;
Wenham et.al. 2009:290).
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